Score

My friend has succeeded in having a sexist advert removed from TV. 

Volkswagen ran an ad that showed a woman in labour being taken to hospital by her male partner. But the paramedic who meets them, is stunned by the amazing car they arrive in and both men are soon engrossed in car worship and ignore the woman. 

My friend filled in the complaints form on VW’s website, pointing out that they had trivialised an event which claims thousands of women’s lives every year. The reply she got was anodyne and grammatically toe-curling. I made a complaint on the website, pointing out that it was also sexist towards men. This is an offensive stereotype that suggests that men are all puerile cretins who don’t care about human life. The e-form barfed back one sentence at me and said this had a syntax error. Kevin said this just meant their server is fracked and you couldn’t really tell whether it was rejecting or giving a receipt. 

Next, my friend e-mailed them again and said that their response was unsatisfactory and that unless they told her they were removing the ad, by a certain date, she would be informing certain newspapers and media. She then received a swift reply saying that the ads were being pulled and that it would take a few days to remove them from all networks.

Booyah. Result, and a good one.

Nicely done.

Scheduling at the Schloss is hectic and for various reasons, I have had to go to the Static on Sunday afternoon and stay over until Monday.

I called in at the Market. A smallish child was hoverin by the pepperdew peppers as I was making towards them.

 ‘Are they very hot?’ She asked.

‘No,’ said I, ‘not at all, they’re quite sweet really.’ Then there was a moment when the unspoken thing hung in the air and we looked at each other.

‘Ok,’ said I, ‘I am British, we have a different scale,’

‘They’d blow my head off, wouldn’t they?’ she asked,

‘No, no, but….’

‘Maybe too much for a seven year-old?’

‘Yep.’